The One That Got Away
by Scarabbug
Summary: An angel of death is sent to the shadow realm to pick up a dead soul guess who Only problem is, the guy's friends just aren't willing to let him go… Rated for language. R and R pleeze.
1. Default Chapter

**The One that Got away. **

**Scarab** – Way-hey, my second Yugioh fic, and this is quite a big one too… well for I know it features an OC but trust me, it's well worth reading this and the Canon characters get a very big role as well. My OC is not the hero of the chapter and she's not a Mary Sue so this is safe to read. I'd also really appreciate some reviews, onegai? Thank u.

Disclaimer – Scarab don't own Yugioh and she's probably never going to own Yugioh or any of the characters in this Fic except for Angeni and me of course, so there'll be no suing me, ok?

"_Now take my hand and hold it tight,_

_I will not fail you here tonight,_

_For failing you, I fail myself,_

_And place my soul upon a shelf,_

_In hell's library without light,_

_I will not fail you here tonight."_

- The Book of Counted Sorrows.

One: The Fetcher's Task. 

I am walking barefoot across hard cold ground, lost in a purple smog and feeling things I haven't felt for centuries –pain, hurt, fear. All those things the dead aren't supposed to be able to notice? Well I can feel them, at least I can in here, and they're all around me, growing like a curse.

Shadow Realm.

Ugh… I hate this place! Fortunately you don't find many souls trapped down there so I don't have to come here often.

"Woah hang on a sec," I hear you crying. "Back up! Who are you and what the hell are you talking about?"

Hm, maybe I should explain that. In fact I have many names to many people. I'm Mary to the Catholics, Psyche to the Greeks… the ancient Egyptians called me a Seraph of the Devourer. Well, something strange like that anyway… (Egyptians –known for their incredible engineering and godly reverence, but certainly not for their novelty in naming their demigods). My friends know me as Angeni, but since we don't yet know each other, you can call me by my job description. I'm the Collector.

Jeeze, I must sound like something out of a cult-horror flick. But I'm not. Let me put it like this, when somebody dies their soul is very often just left wandering until I show up. I collect up souls, in the same way as the humans collect their duel cards.

I'm one of the angels. But then you'd probably guessed that by now hadn't you? I'm the Fetcher. Normally I just deal with the obvious things, car crash victims, old age, the occasional suicide, that kind of thing… people who's bodies have been killed in the real world and who's souls are wandering vaguely around, trying to figure out where they're supposed to go next.

Sometimes this can be annoying –a lot of souls tend to wander since they don't like hanging round in those mortuaries and sometimes I have to do a bit of hunting before I can find them.

But let me tell you, finding a soul wandering around the real world is easy compared to trying to find one _here_. Not to mention a lot less terrifying. Very, very rarely do I have to deal with deaths of such a…

…Well, supernatural nature.

Why do these people have to make things so difficult? You know ever since some damn smart ass up there recreated the ancient gods as duel monster cards we've had nothing but trouble.

I wander around in the cold, dull dark, feeling my way through the sticky purple air that surrounds me like a blanket of spider's webs – tight and clingy and unbearably cold. if I were alive then it would likely have killed me by now –suffocating me with its thickly poisoned air and ripped me up with the incredible pressure it puts on the heart and brain and nervous system.

It's not often that I end up trying to find a soul in a place like this – thank goodness.

The thing about the Shadow Realm, is that there are a whole lot of rules that don't apply to reality.

Let me explain it like this. Sometimes, if you've been really, _really_ unlucky in death, say… you picked a duel with a malicious, evil entity and lost, you can end up cursed by a terrible dark magic. You get incarcerated in the Shadow Realm. The complete punishment. A world of pain you can't ever escape. Purgatory.

None of those names for it could be considered an understatement. I've only been once or twice, and only for a few minutes at a time, but the place is sheer torture.

You don't get many people trapped in there (you don't get many people dumb enough to duel against demons who can incarcerate their souls) but it happens. Normally there's nothing we can do about it. But every now and then, you get someone who's… different… a soul that gets sent to the shadow realm, but really doesn't _deserve_ that kind of torture.

Should that circumstance arise, guess who they send down there to negotiate? You got it – yours truly.

This is one of those times. I've been sent right into the shadow realm itself to pick up a soul who I've just been informed is separated from the body and become trapped. It takes me a damn long time to find it, not that I'm digging deep. Everything I touch tries to stick to me or drag me in somewhere I don't want to go.

I really don't want to be here. It's too frightening. Even angels are at risk in the shadow realm. But it's not like I have a choice in the matter, this is…

Well… this is what I do. The fetcher and the carrier, that's me. I have been doing this for so many thousands of years, but I will never forget my first.

**Hm… okay I know that was a bit hard going but trust me the next Chapter is better, if a bit short… okay, I'm gonna write it now… enjoy. **


	2. The Pharaoh

**Okay here goes part two… NOW you get to see your heroes in action… at last!**

Two: The Pharaoh.

_The first soul I ever had to take with me belonged to someone called Atemu. An ancient ruler. An Egyptian. _

_A Pharaoh, to be exact. _

_Now that was a guy with some spirit. (In more ways than one). I was actually there you know. Right there on the battlefield, hiding in the body of a slave. I was there to witness the last breath, his last few moments with soul connected to body. _

_Ugh. _

_The sight was definitely not a pretty one (apocalypses never are –I should know I've seen two of em') yet it was so unbelievably heroic. The way his violet eyes glowed in the rising rage of shadows leaking from the shadow-world to our own. The way his body and might and the might of the millennium items plunged deep into the shadows, driving back whatever forces came to rip this world to pieces, only to have his own body ripped and torn to pieces in the process. I've never seen anyone die with such… distinction. So my first encounter with a soul of the dead, was also my first encounter with the shadow realm, and the horror it created. _

_Well. The body was their business. My task just involved the soul. _

_I had only been dead for a short while myself you understand, so I was kinda new to this whole thing… and here they were getting me to go fetch the soul of a pharaoh?! _

_More than that, an extremely reluctant pharaoh who just completely refused to die for me. _

_Why are the great rulers always the stubborn ones? My first ever fetching and the damn soul refused to come with me! Even when he saw his own body in the sand he refused to take my hand. _

_I found his body in the desert long after the shadows had faded from the landscape, miles from anywhere and anything. The shadows had carried the battle far out into the depths of the desert and that was where I found the body, and the last relics of the pharaoh's spirit in amongst the dunes._

_I'm not ashamed to admit it. There were still tears in my eyes at this point. Less that two hours ago I had watched this man dying. Slowly, painfully, ripped to shreds for the sake of this world. The fight had been a remarkable one and I never imagined anyone could die with such courage._

_And yet the man –the monster– who had caused this death still lived, still walked, still breathed. It seemed so bitterly unfair. Why should the good suffer for the fate of others, while the evil walk alive? _

_I knelt down before the broken body, shaking slightly with a mixture of fear and nervousness, like a child with a game she doesn't yet know how to play and is frightened she'll lose at. I had never seen death before, and now, I was sitting right in front of it. I could see no blood, no physical signs of wounding or damage, not even a rip in the material of his clothing. The Shadow Realm doesn't work like that. It attacks the mind rather than the body – wearing it down to exhaustion, and ultimately to death. Like some kind of violent drug. _

_The trickiest part was finding his spirit. Not all souls are wanderers, and the human spirit is set very deep. Sometimes, I have to use every ounce of angel in me to force my way through the thin corridors of the human mind and into the soul chamber. To seek out the soul from the inside. _

_On this occasion I did not have to do that. His body as been so ripped apart that even the defences of his mind have weakened. I pick away a few mere shreds of consciousness, and lift the soul upwards from the body. Driving back into him the energy that death took away. _

_It's rather like… opening a fruit. Throwing away the empty shell and everything else that in unneeded in the afterlife, taking out what is pure and important, if that makes any sense… it took a while, but eventually the pharaoh's eyes opened and he looked right at me wearing an extremely bewildered expression. I suspect that of all the hundreds of things he had expected to happen to him after being sucked into the mouth of hell, I was definitely not one of them. The eyes looked into mine, wide and astonished. _

_But he wasn't as astonished as I was, let me tell you. _

'_Oh...' I found myself gasping aloud without meaning too. I had never seen eyes quite like those before. _

_Upon hearing my voice, the spirit's arm reached out and gripped mine, as if trying to gain some kind of strength and stability from me. _

_Well, I was thinking to myself, this is going well so far._

'_It… It's alright,' I promised him, trying hard to make myself sound reverent, 'I shan't hurt you. Nothing will ever hurt any longer, my pharaoh.' _

_For a long moment there was silence and all the while I smiled, remembering what I had been told word for word back at headquarters _"No sudden movements, no surprises, remain calm and dignified and for goodness sakes try and employ some sympathy. You are dealing with the dead, and they deserve as much compassion as the living."

_But I just couldn't get over those eyes. They hadn't seemed nearly so bright in the battle when I had watched them boring into the face of an enemy. Yet now they just seemed to gleam with light. Their colour was strange too, a unique glowing purple that I'd never seen before. the same colour as the shadow realms smoke, and yet despite this, somehow beautiful. _

_This was the point where the pharaoh seemed to find his tongue. _

'_T-the God Cards…'_

'_Gone,' I smiled at him, trying to appear as sensitive as I could. 'Gone and so are the shadows… and so are you, Pharaoh. You have committed a courageous act, and you paid for it with your life. I promise you, your sacrifice will not go unrequited…' I reached out and took hold of his hand in my own white gloved fingers. The pharaoh stood up before me, but his body stayed where it was, lying there in the sand beneath us. I reckon that freaked him out even more. I remember looking at his face and smiling a little harder than I was meant to. Standing there with me in the sand and sun, he looked so… well, lost. Not ast all the bold, defiant hero whom I had witnessed earlier. _

_They normally do look at way. Lost. I mean, it's always a nasty shock for people, seeing their own body lying dead on the earth. _

'_Come with me, Pharaoh.' _

_Atemu looked at me firmly through those large violet eyes, (it was only a second but I swear we made a connection!)_

'_I can't …'_

_I lost my tongue. It sounds so stupid, but that really wasn't what I expected him to say. I stood there twitching for a second or two. It was all I could do to mutter a rather pathetic: 'Pardon?' _

'_F… forgive me for taking your time, my lady… I just can't… I can't come.'_

_Well I was pretty confused by this at first, (though I was pretty pleased he called me a lady) but eventually I worked it out. Of course… he was frightened wasn't he? Who wouldn't be? I mean the kind of things the Egyptians believed were in store for them in the afterlife were certainly no picnic. _

'_I know this is hard, pharaoh, believe me I do… I felt this way too when it was my turn, but—'_

'_My turn?' Atemu smiled at me –it was a very cute smile. 'No… you don't understand. It does not feel like… my turn.'_

_Well, this guy was just one big riddle. I remember looking uneasily at the body beneath us in a touch of distaste. He saw me looking and I think he got my point. 'No. It's not that. I do not fear death today, my lady, I have faced it often enough…' _

'_Then… what is it?'_

_Atemu looked down uneasily at his own body in the rough of the sand. Already a sandstorm is kicking up and he looks half concealed in earth. Not exactly what you'd call a fitting burial for a pharaoh… I hoped they'd find him soon. It wasn't right that a champion who did so much for mankind should be left this way. 'I fear for this world,' he said to me plainly. 'I fear for this world and I cannot leave it in peril.'_

_I didn't quite know what to say. Fear for this world? Peril? What in the name of the Gods was he talking about? What was there to fear now? I watched him for a long moment, I remember I mumbled something like – 'You've already given your life for the good of these people… isn't that enough?'_

_Atemu sighed and looked up at the blue-hot sky. 'a few hours ago,' he murmured, 'that sky boiled with the blackness of another world… a world more terrible than any other the gods could create. It seems so strange and distance now…'_

'Of _course it does,' I answered him, tyring to smile. 'Because it is distant. All that's in the past… you, Pharaoh, will go down in the realms of history for your actions today. You will go to your end as the hero who saved this world from the beasts of the shadow realm and the wrath of evil, is that not good enough for you?'_

'_The millennium items.'_

_He said that so suddenly, he caught me by surprise. _

'_Yes,' I said uneasily. I tried really hard to sound like I knew what I was talking about. 'I know of them. You… created them, didn't you?' _

'_Yes and they are a source of terrible and tremendous power. I am the only one who can yield them safely.' _

_I felt his hand touch my shoulder. He seemed weirdly soft and cool. Not like I'd expected the touch of a dead soul to feel at all. (Lets not forget, this was my first case.) 'Please… try to understand, I cannot go with you. I must stay. I must find some way to remain here. I must find some way to guard these items for the time when evil comes for them again… and evil will come for them again, my lady. Be it before the next sunrise, or centuries from now…' _

'_B-but… but… I can't just leave you! For Ra's sakes…' I struggled, trying to devise some kind of half decent excuse. '…If I let you go I would never hear the end of it!'_

'_Would you place your own status over the importance of every life on this world?' He snapped at me. 'I must not leave. This world may have taken my body, but perhaps… it still has want of my soul.' _

_Okay, perhaps it's not the best idea to get ticked off with a pharaoh, but I was seriously pissed with him right then. _

'_This is ridiculous!' I screamed at him. 'What would become of your soul if I left you? This… this is my duty!'_

'_And my duty is to protect these worlds,' the pharaoh told me. 'For now, and for all time. Something I cannot do from hereafter.' _

_He just had such a look on his face, such a firm, unyielding, don't-you-dare-mess-with-me expression. Exactly what was I supposed to say? Nobody had ever told me what to do if the soul said something like that. I sighed, gritting my teeth tightly together. Just my luck to get one like this on my very first assignment! _

_I had no idea what would become of him… a formless spirit in the world of the living. Where would he exist? How would he exist? _

_Yet… somehow I just couldn't argue with him. I couldn't quite convince myself that I was right and he was wrong. _

_I let him go…_

_Heaven knows why I did it, but I could not keep his soul. I could not force him to follow me into the hereafter when he wanted so badly to stay, so who knows what happened to him. To the spirit of the pharaoh who saved this world. _

_You know, that was just about the beginning for me of a lifelong terrible career as a Fetcher who has serious issues with taking away the souls of the dead… _

_I remember sighing and taking a final look at the body. The empty shell of a pharaoh. Like I said – it was the first time I had witnessed death, and it frightened me. Especially with it being so deadly and violent. _

_I picked up my dress and hauled myself over the hot sand towards the pyramids. Thanks to The Great Pharaoh Atemu, I was completely behind schedule._

_Then again the schedule was probably the least of my problems right about then. The masters weren't exactly what you'd call pleased with me – _"The foolish novice allowed the soul of an Egyptian pharaoh to evade the afterlife?… Is she completely insane?!" _I believe were their exact words. _

_Nobody could believe it. But that's the truth as I remember it (baring in mind my memory's probably on the shaky size –five thousand years in storage and all that.) _

_They'd lost souls before, thanks to inexperienced new Fetchers not having the courage or heart to tear them away from the lives and homes they loved so dearly. They'd just never lost anyone as important as a pharaoh. I never knew what happened to Atemu. _

_At least I wasn't fired. _

_And five millennia and fifty thousand souls later… here I am. Guess that makes me a veteran. _

_A veteran who, in all rights, should have been kicked out on her very first day. _

**Muse** – Aww she let Atemu's soul evade the afterlife… that was nice of her…

**Scarab** – well actually it's not nice at all Musey. It's actually really dangerous. I mean what good is a soul wandering round without his body? She just didn't have the heart to take his soul because then she would have considered his death to be partly her fault. It wasn't kindness, it was sort of cowardliness.

**Muse** – O.o? Ooh Scarab… you actually created a cowardly character! Tsk… well I never…

**Scarab** – oh cut it out Musey. Just come and help me write the next bit okay?


	3. Aibou

**Scarab** – Okay here we go with part three…

**Muse** – FINALLY we're getting somewhere. When're we gonna get to see some duelling here, Scarab? This IS set during Match of the Millenium you know!

**Scarab**- I know! Be patient Musey, the action is coming. Now do the disclaimer.

**Muse** - sighs Okay, okay, listen people, Scarab don't own anything okay, you know the deal now get on and read… turns to Scarab did I do that okay?

**Scarab** – fair enough…

THREE: Aibou.

I'm going nostalgic. Trying to distract myself from this awful place by remembering other times. It's not working, and I still can't find the soul I'm here for. It's like trying to find a needle in a gargantuan sized haystack.

There is life all around me, though I cannot see it. It's a strange, ghostly kind of life that doesn't think for itself at all. The dirt beneath me seems to crawl as if conscious of my presence and the air around me curdles into unimaginable shapes, all of them horrific. The shadow realm is filled with these kind of monsters. Lost dreams and living nightmares.

I swear violently under my breath as I pull my way through the misty clamminess that surrounds me like a fog as thick as water. The masters wouldn't like me swearing but I don't care –they can't hear me down here anyway. The one advantage of being in the shadow realm is that down here an angel can curse as much as she likes and nobody bats an eyelid.

I think of the soul that's trapped here. I think of other souls I have dragged from this place. Sometimes a soul could be trapped here for weeks –months!– before we even realise its existence. Months of horror and torture in this place that drains the very hope from your heart and the life from your spirit.

I cross my fingers, hoping whoever I am here for now had not been trapped here quite that long.

My prayer gets answered.

I've found it.

I walk slowly through the mist, hesitantly in the direction of the crumbled figure . And as I draw closer something else becomes obvious. The soul has fallen across a small platform, a kind of stage that towards above me in the shadows. I pause. Confused.

What on earth…

A duel arena. I realise abruptly. That's what it is, an arena. I walk up towards the figure – who I think is an empty soul – it's a boy alright. At last this soul has an identity and I don't have to keep calling him "it". Just a young one. He looks the same as any of the dead I've ever encountered in this place. His face is sheer white and his eyes tightly shut and unseeing. There's not a drop of colour left to him, except maybe in his eyes, but I can't see them.

He's clutching something in one hand, it looks like a set of duel cards.

That's not right… duel cards? Why would a _soul_ lost in the shadow realm be carrying duel cards?

In fact, why is there an arena here at all? I touch the thin metal walls of the holographic arena around me, just trying to reassure myself that they're real. They're real alright, real and solid.

In fact now that I look at it…

Oh my Lord…

Well this is a strange sight if ever I saw one. I could be mistaken but…

No, I'm not wrong. I'm not wrong at all, but I wish I was. It looks as if this boy's soul wasn't just imprisoned here _after_ his body's death… No. The BODY is here too… the physical human body. I can feel his flesh in my hands and the last glimmer of life still crackling in his skin. The residue of pain.

This isn't an unconscious soul before me… it's a DEAD body.

What in the name of the Gods…?

No. No this isn't right. I'm here looking for a wandering soul aren't I? There shouldn't be a BODY! Not _here_ in the Shadows. Not unless…

The horrible truth just hit me.

This boy wasn't killed and _then_ had his soul banished to the shadow realm… his living body was sent to the shadow realm…

…and _then_ died there.

This boy _died_ in the Shadow Realm itself.

This's never happened before in my lifetime and I admit, it unnerves me.

Well actually that's not true. A very long time ago, thousands of years in fact, certain humans with incredible skill and strength were able to enter the shadow realm while still alive –and survive there. Here, they carried out tremendous and terrible battles, using the power of their minds combined with the shadow realm's twisted, malicious enemies to call up the power of monsters to fight to the death. They called these great fights, _Shadow Games_. It was in one of these games that my first, Atemu won back the life of his world, but lost his own battle for survival. (Then of course he had to play the heroics with me and almost resulted in me losing my job on my very first day.)…

I thought that dangerous fashion had died out millennia ago… obviously not.

So… is that what I have arrived at now? The scene of some kind of twisted duel being waged in the shadow realm between two living beings who have somehow gained the power to skip form one world to another…?

So that means this child must have died of exhaustion –exhaustion and mental engulfment, slowly drained down to his last drop of strength, while trying to fight in a shadow duel.

From the look on his face, he fought his duel and the shadow realm's influence hard, harder than a lot of adults can, and for a very long time… he fought with every last ounce of energy and every last fibre of his being.

A lump comes to my throat. Who on earth would do something so disgusting to anyone?

It's always worst for me when it's kids. Especially the really young ones. You've got to go through the whole horrible round of answering all their endless questions, "where are we going?", "will my doggie be there?", "why can't mommy come too?", "why not?" and –worst of all– "are you an angel?"…

Duh! Of _course_ I'm an angel, why do you think I'm here, taking your soul away from your body?

I'm sorry; I must sound so vindictive… I'm not, honestly, it's just…

Well, it's been so long, and I've had to answer those questions so many times, and yet it always hurts me as much as it did the first. Every last "why?" stabs at me like it's ME who's getting killed.

I hate taking people away. I just H-A-T-E it. I hate seeing the hurt and sadness on their faces as I take their hand and lead them away. The fact that I'm taking them into paradise rarely consoles them.

Then sometimes –quite often in fact– they decide at the last minute that they really, really HAVE to pop back, just for a second to see somebody important or tell someone something they never got the chance to say in life, and I try to tell them that that's just not possible and then they start begging me. _"Please, just give me one minute"_, they say_"just one minute,"_ and I'd stare at their teary faces and I end up giving in and muttering 'oh alright, I'll give you a minute… go say your goodbyes, but be quick about it!' Then I let them go and watch them rush back through the ether to say goodbye to their beloveds.

It's never "just a minute" then, let me tell you. Give a soul an inch and they'll take a mile. I wait as long as I can but eventually, I have to go back down there and drag them off again, quite frequently kicking and screaming. And _then_ I get back up to headquarters and I have to make up some wild fantasy story as to why I'm late so that my bosses don't find out I've been letting people run rampant in the real world after their death.

I'm too soft, that's my trouble. I can't stand to see people suffer (so you may wonder how I got lumbered with this job in the first place) Dying is hard enough, but dying without getting to say goodbye to the people you love…

No. I had to go through that myself. I wouldn't wish it on anyone else. It's against every law in the book but… I keep finding that this is one rule I can't help breaking.

And then of course, there are the shadow souls –that's the name we have for the souls that get imprisoned in the shadow realm, like this one. Normally these are rotten, corrupted minds but every now and then somebody's soul ends up in there who was decent, kind and an all around good guy, and you can't just leave a good soul locked up in purgatory like that when they should be in paradise, can you?

The biggest problem with taking souls from the shadow realm is that… we don't always know if they're dead or not. See, you can have your soul imprisoned, but your BODY _still alive_ in the real world, and if that's the case then the soul can't be taken. This has been happening a lot more frequently lately. We have to keep sending down experts to assess whether the body is dead and the soul can be moved, or whether we simply have to leave them to suffer.

Well, this one is dead alright. I don't need any experts to tell me that…

_But this body_ _should not be here!!!_

And if this is the body then where's his soul? Still here perhaps, hiding somewhere within this broken body? Souls don't (and can't) always get away from their containers, and if I were a lost soul round here _I _certainly wouldn't want to go wandering.

I look up and gaze at the darkness around us. I run my hands over the thin metal frame of the huge structure before us. My thin hands touch the surface the body fell over and feel something smooth and card-like.

More duel cards…

I was right… this _was_ a duel. A shadow duel that took this boy's life. Surely there must be an opponent, but there's so much fog. I can't make anything out except…

Wait…

Oh lord, what in HELL is that?

If that is the duel-monster creator's idea of some twisted joke then they've certainly succeeded in terrifying me.

I've never seen a monster like it before… not since the gods. It's so huge it towers above me and I can see the veins pulsing in its dirt-mauve flesh. It stands in the dark of the arena with its single eye glaring at me. A millennium eye. A symbol of the millennium items – of intense power being used for destruction… A shiver races right through me like a dart. It is just as Atemu feared all those centuries ago. Just what he tried to remain in this world to prevent.

Who would create a monster like this? Something fabricated for death and destruction.

Somebody's laughing, their voice making echoes in the wall-less realm around us. "One down" they're saying. Like this boy's death is part of some kind of tally he's working his way through one by one. Chills race up and down my spine like knives. Then I remember, whoever it is, they can't see me anymore than I can see them right now. We're both lost in the fog.

I put my hands against the boy's body. It's still warm, sleep-like.

'Places to go, kid.'

…I don't know why I do that. Talking to the dead, empty shells where people used to live. Force of habit I guess, makes this whole thing a little easier.

I take a single step with my subconscious and unlock the thin threads of this boy's mind to step inside.

It's dark at first. Dark and empty and then my eyes start to get used to thinks and I walk very slowly through the boys inner corridors. The strange smell and presence tells me that I'm right – the soul is still here. It never left the broken body and if I search a little I'm bound to find him. The whole corridor around me is dull and splintered, thin trails of cracks run throughout the walls – the signs of a mind that has been viciously attacked by the rampant energies of the shadow realm. The sign of a soul which has, in short, been tortured to death.

I find the door and grip the handle tight in one hand. I'm uneasy. This is not the first time I have stepped into somebody's soul room (heck it's in my job description) but for some strange reason…

I don't know. Maybe it's stress doing this to me. Maybe I'm just so shaken up by seeing this boys body lying dead in this horrible realm and knowing how harsh that death was that makes me nervous to delve any deeper into this twisted mystery.

But I know I have to. So even though it's against all my better judgement. I open the door.

The soul room is like everything else in this boy's body –dark and empty and littered with broken debris. In this case the debris consists of broken toys and games, pilled puzzles. Like the wreckage of a child's bedroom after a fire.

All these toys… a symbol of pure innocence ripped to pieces. Great. Now I feel even more sick.

But the soul must be in here somewhere, so I steel myself to delve deeper. Whatever it is waiting for me in here, it can't possibly be as bad as what I've already seen.

Then I stop.

What's that…?

I can hear voices. Voices whispering. No not whispering at all, _yelling_. Yelling in panic and fear.

/Yugi? YUGI!/

I lurch back towards the door, frightened and amazed. It's a name. I'm hearing someone calling a name.

It's nothing new to me. I've heard that kind of pleading a thousand times before. Whenever I step inside a dead being's inner mind, I can hear the echo of the voices in the world outside. The soft, sobbing of people who loved them. The begging of friends, fighting to somehow bring them back to life… But _this_ voice… Why does _this_ voice seem to be so different, so…

…close?

Maybe that's because it IS close…

Maybe that's because it's right in front of me.

There's another figure another person hiding in the recesses of this boy's subconscious. I can barely make out his feature's in the darkness, but he's there. He's holding the soul – the human-shaped spirit of the boy's spirit, limp in his arms, and it's his voice I am hearing crying a name.

What's going on here? There shouldn't be anyone else in here, I'm inside the kid's mind for goodness sakes!

Yet there IS somebody there. Inside this dead body with me. somebody who should not be there. Who could it be? A stranger? Somebody from the other side who got here before me? That happens sometimes…

But no… this figure sounds too hurt, too grief stricken by all this to be a measly minion send by the darkness to claim a helpless soul.

He FEELS like darkness though. I can sense it. The figure before me practically radiates a sense of coldness and misery. Like if you touched him, your skin would turn grey.

/I can't feel him/ he whispers. For a moment I think he's talking to me and struggle to think how to reply. Does he know I'm here? How can he see me? /I can't sense his spirit. I can no longer feel the presence of his young mind…/

I hesitate, shivering with relief. Thank goodness. He's talking to himself. He can't see me and he obviously has no idea at all that I'm here, though even if he did right now I doubt he would care. /No… no he can't be gone! YUGI!/

Yugi… is that this boy's name?

That's an ironic name if ever I heard one… the word Yugi means "Game"… or "Play". And that's how this boy died. In a game which can bode no true winners and brings only hurt and pain. Yugi by name, Yugi by nature.

For a long moment, there's silence. It's so dim in here. I wish I could see him clearer. He seems so familiar somehow… it feels like I'm dreaming. Like something isn't quite right with anything in the world right now, and that sensation frightens me. Who is this being and what's he doing within this boy's mind? He seems so familiar...

/Why did you do it, Yugi?/ The figure is whispering again. his voice is cracked with pain. /You _knew_… you knew you couldn't take it. why did you sacrifice yourself like this? This shouldn't have happened to you./

**"Forget him…"**

That voice… it's the same, smug, calculating voice I heard out in the duelling arena.** "The boy was too weak…"** I feel so frightened. Like I want to explode. I know that whoever he is, _he's_ the weakling, the killer toying with the souls of those smaller than him. What kind of cruel monster would do this to a child? **"Face it. Yugi is gone and it's just you and me now."**

Maybe I'm just getting used to the dark… or maybe things have somehow become brighter. But the figure before me looks up and I see the soft glow of a pair of bright violet eyes and all of a sudden my heart skips its beat.

Oh Gods… it can't be.

Five thousand years and yet that face is still fresh. Those eyes are still as clear to me as ever they were. I know who this is.

Atemu.

Okay so he's not exactly the same. There've been changes in him… five millennia's worth of changes. His clothes are different, strange, his eyes… they seem different too, filled with something that wasn't present when I first met him in the sands of Egypt and pulled his soul from his body. But I'd never forget the face of the pharaoh.

I stop. Stuck in silence. The second time I've ever seen him in my life and once again all I can do is stand there looking like an idiot. I'm confused… would he know me? It's been such a long time. surely he doesn't know I'm here. Oh Atemu it's you! It's really you I'm seeing, and as beautiful as you were the very first time I met you.

Only, a lot of that beauty's hidden now. Hidden in pain and hurt and anger. Even on the day I told you of your death, you didn't look nearly as distraught as you do now. I never imagined I'd see tears in those eyes but I'm seeing them. Not a great many of them, he's not weeping uncontrollable but somehow, these few small tears feel worse than it would have felt if his whole body was wracked with sobs.

Atemu… you know this child don't you? You care about him, and that monster out there's taken him away from you…

/Oh Yugi…/ Atemu whispers, holding the body tight in his arms. The boy remains motionless and silent. Sometimes, souls are like this. It depends on the person, and of course, on the death. This particular boy will be that way until I make contact with him, give him the ability to exist without a body, the spark he needs to journey to the afterlife.

But Atemu doesn't look like he wants that to happen. He's holding onto him like a father holds onto a son. Like he'll never let him go. Those beautiful eyes are filled with tears of rage and sorrow.

Angels don't cry. They are incapable of crying, they have no choice but to keep every last ounce of their fear and pain locked up deep inside of them. it's a method of protection thing more than anything else. it shields us from our own emotions and doesn't let them interfere with our lives.

But if I could cry now, then I'm sure I would do.

/I'm sorry Aibou … I'm so sorry… It's my fault... It's all my fault. Ishould never have allowed this to happen to you./

A PHARAOH making an apology? And to a human boy!

Well, wonders today will never end.

Atemu carefully lowers the boy's spirit to the ground, letting his head fall limply against the stone floor. For a moment there is the same sullen silence that I felt in the moments before I left him in the desert millennia ago.

Then he's gone. Where? I don't know. Outside I guess, back to the battle.

But… but how can HE fight?

I hesitate again. I know I should just do what I'm here to do and get out of here now, but… for just a moment, I feel I have to follow him. I leave the confines of the boy's mind and step back out into the dark, and there I am again in the ominous quiet of the shadow realm standing over a body which now starts moving.

Okay now that just scares the living daylights out of me! Well how many times in your life has a dead body stood up right in front of you?

Only… it's not the boy I see looking out through this body's eyes, but Atemu…

Atemu, using this child's body.

Ah… now I understand…

Well, I think I do, to be honest none of this makes much sense but…

Atemu? The very pharaoh I met on the day of his death, existing as a spirit inside this boy's body?

The pharaoh stands up, he grips his hand tightly supporting his body – the boy's body – against the frame of the arena. His eyes fall across the empty space of the arena. I can hear his eyes screaming in rage even though no sound emerges from his mouth. The sheer force of his voice hits me so hard that I shudder.

**_/Murderer_**!/

I tremble as he looks straight across the arena. I'm standing so close I could reach out and touch him, and yet he does not know I am there. he's unable to see me. Only the one I came for will be able to see me now.

As I look, I notice something around the boy –Atemu's– neck. Something I never expected to see in a million years. A puzzle of gold shaped like a pyramid. Yes, that's a millennium item alright.

'You used your underhanded tactics to overwhelm Yugi's mind,' he hisses heatedly in a voice that begs battle. 'You will _pay_ for what you did!'

I can see him now, the rival. Standing in the shadow of the monstrous beast that still stands on the field. I can see a thin long smile and a flash of unnatural silver hair. I can see a soft glimmer of golden light shining where there should be an eye in his head…

The glow of a millennium item… the millennium eye? Is that how this strange man brought this battle to the shadow realm?

Then… Atemu was _right_. All those years ago when he swore to me that darkness would return. It _has_ returned. Returned in the form of the tall, cruel man standing opposite us… and in the form of this boy.

'So I take it,' the rival speaks at last, 'from this emotional outburst, that you're having a difficult time acknowledging the fact that you _failed_ in your self-appointed duty to protect your little duelling protégé.' He shakes his head. 'Whoever you are perhaps Yugi would have been better off _without_ your interference, hm?'

The sorrowful anger inside of Atemu is welling up and growing like the storm of the shadow realm around us. I feel like screaming.

'Be silent!' he yells. 'For what you have done… I will show you _no_ mercy!'

The figure stares at him firmly, and nods, as if satisfied with the threat. I don't know why. If Atemu had said to me what he just said to him like that I would be cowering on my knees. I have never heard such vehemence and pain in my life…

'Then let the game continue,' he says. it's your turn, and you no longer have Yugi there to help you. Once more your mind is an open book to me.'

_Your mind is an open book_? What does he mean?

I stand rooted to the spot, unable to move. Unable to drag myself away from the battle. But before I can think of anything, the Millennium Eye bursts into a shining explosion of blue fire. At the same time, Atemu draws a card from the pack before him. 'The card you drew is winged dragon and guardian of the fortress, a weak monster,'

He's right…

I can see it for myself. The card this enemy said is the very card which now lies in Atemu's hand. I tremble. That is the power of a Millennium item, sure enough.

This man is reading Atemu's mind!!! Reading the cards in his hand, reading the strategies in his head… cheating. Cheating to win this shadow duel by whatever means necessary.

That monster! That twisted, demented bastard! He has killed a child just so he can win some ridiculous shadow duel?

I reach out and touch Atemu on the shoulder near his throat, just as I did all those years ago in the sand of the shadow realm. (He still feels exactly the same as he did the first time) And when I do I can read his thoughts quite clearly.

/Pegasus just read my mind/ I hear his thoughts echoing with the obvious. /So now he knows all the cards in my hand… the only card he doesn't know…/ He hesitates, drawing a breath and glancing unevenly at a single card lying on the field.

/…Is the one Yugi left on the field… but I have no way of knowing if that's a card that can tip the duel in my favour./ His eyes tighten with anger, determination, fear as he draws the card and slams it down. 'I play one card in defence mode, Pegasus… it's your move!'


	4. Angel Choices

**Muse** – Erm…... Scarab? SCARAB!

**Scarab**- Wha?... W-what? Who?

**Muse** – Scarab wake up it's time to do the disclaimer.

**Scarab** – moans, pulls blankets over her head.

**Muse** – hey! Pulls quilts off bed come on lady there are people reading this thing, you can't just leave it at chapter three, now wake up and do the disclaimer.

**Scarab** groans - oh alright, alright…okay people you know the drill. I don't own anything now… go read and leave me in peace…. Zzzzzzzzz v.v

FOUR: Angels Making Choices

God, I have no idea whatsoever what is going on.

I don't know what to do, this was never in my job description! (We specialise in life and death, we're not supposed to deal with the bits that come in-between)

You haven't got time for watching games and reminiscing, Angeni… for the love of the gods, _take_ the soul and get out of here.

Once again reminded of exactly what I'm here for I rush back into the dead corridors of the boys mind. I can feel my heart pounding in my chest through the thin linen of my clothes.

The boy is still there. It's not as if I had expected him to go anywhere.

The battle doesn't matter now, I tell myself firmly. Atemu doesn't matter, the millennium items do not matter. None of that is your concern, Angeni, you are here for this boy's spirit and you are taking him now, before anything else goes wrong.

I kneel down on the floor as Atemu did and reach out to take hold of the ethereal boy's shoulders. He feels thin and fragile, like if I squeeze too hard, he'll break. All the same I hold onto his vague form as tight as I can and will awareness back into him.

After a moment, the spirit reawakens. As much as the dead _can_ reawaken anyway, please bear in mind that this soul is clinically dead. Before I can move or speak, he snatches out a hand and grips my arm tightly in a fist.

Hell, for a little guy he's got a good grip.

'Spirit?'

_Spirit_?

Is he talking about Atemu? Surely they know about each other. I try to smile at him, to act the way I do around all dead souls, reassuring and calm and deceptively casual. But somehow or another, my voice starts cracking as soon as I speak.

'H-hello, Yugi…'

I expect him to answer me. Usually when I speak to people like that, the very first thing they say back is "How do you know my name?" I guess I expected him to say something similar.

Only he doesn't. He doesn't seem that interested in me and now he sits up and instantly tries to drag his hand away from mine. 'L-let go of me…'

'No,' I whisper, stumbling on my words. 'I-I mean… its alright, Yugi. I won't hurt you…'

I break off, shocked as the rattle of a Duel monster cry rings in my ears. I can feel the battle outside intensifying. Feel Atemu's voice echoing all around me.

The boy hears it too and he's trying to stand up, to get away from me, only now I have a hold of him I'm not letting him go. 'Spirit!' he yells into nothing. I guess he's calling for Atemu. 'Spirit, what's happening?'

'Don't bother Yugi, he… he can't hear you. Nobody can hear you, expect me.'

Yugi looks at me, his eyes are bright with fear. Only now do I realise their colour –they're violet. Bright glowing violet, just like the pharaoh's, only _unlike_ the pharaoh's, his are dulled by the presence of death.

'W-who are you?' he asks me sharply. 'What do you want?'

'Why… why you, Yugi. I'm… I mean I-I was sent here to fetch you.'

'Get back!' he snaps at me. 'Get away I-I have to help the spirit of the puzzle!'

Spirit of the puzzle?…

So _that's_ what Atemu has been doing these last god knows how many millennia, hiding out in his own millennium puzzle… sharing that body of another. Incredible.

'Yugi please listen to me, I _know_ I must seem like a special effect but… but you're… you're not alive any longer, he can't hear what you're saying. You can't help anyone.'

Well if I want to calm him down then I'm going the wrong way about it. 'Yugi please, you must understand we must get out of this place now…' I reach out to take hold of his wrist again and again he pulls away. For a dead boy, he's got a lot of spark in him.

'No!' he yells. 'I won't go anywhere with you! I don't even know who you are!'

'M… my name is Angeni. Yugi please, you must believe me, I wouldn't lie to you, you… you died.'

When I say that he doesn't even look surprised, just… irrationally determined.Like this is something he expected and not something he is going to allow to get in his way.

'No! I won't be, I won't die here, I won't.'

Great, he's in denial. Just typical, why do I _always_ get the deniers?

'I… I know it may not feel that way Yugi but it's _true_. Your other spirit fights without you now. You cannot duel again. you were killed by the stress of the shadow realm around you and now I have to—'

'I just told you!' the boy yells at me, interrupting the middle of my sentence. I think I preferred him when he was lying dead in Atemu's arms. 'I won't die here! I have to help the spirit, he can't fight this alone!'

I sigh angrily. I don't have time for this, I yell. We cannot stay here any longer. You must leave your spirit to do as he pleases. I try to take his arm again, struggling to pull him close and drag us outwards from his mind and into the world beyond. He fights back against me, trying to lash out. His eyes are so bright they almost burn me. I haven't seen a will to live like this since…

Well, since Atemu…

…

…'_Yugi!' _

Then all at once – smash.

That's exactly what it feels like. Like somebody had just belted me in the stomach with as much mind-power as they can muster. There's a sharp flash of light and a pain to my heart.

Before I know it the boy is ripped away from me and flung into darkness, as I'm tossed violently out of his mind and send tumbling into the dirt amidst the growing shadows. I choke and leap up out of the thin fumes gathered around the shadow realm floor, gasping in pain and rearing away from the sticky, gruesome substance all around me, bewildered and disorientated. Gods, whatever that was, it felt like a near death experience!

Okay. _Now_ I'm panicking. Where is he? How did I end up out here? What happened to the boy?

So many questions and I can't answer a single one of them. Once again I see the battle before me. The duel going on between that monster and whatever it is that Atemu is trying to drag out of his deck. I don't know what that monster is, but as strong as it seems, it doesn't look like it'd leave so much as a mark on Atemu's rival's massive beast with its billion eyes. I can hear Atemu's voice crying, still fraught with anger and pain and strength…

'Chaos mage, prepare yourself. Try to hold him off!' It isn't so much an instruction as it is as hopeful stab at encouragement. Atemu is yelling to his monster, trying to give it the strength he could not give to the boy whose vessel he shares. Only Pegasus's response is a disgusting leer of laughter.

'There is nothing you can do to hold this attack off!'

Only to be honest, I'm not really interested in that duel right now.

What I'm interested in is happening right in front of me. I crouch in the dirt staring into the darkness all around me. Only now it is not so dark anymore. Somewhere around me is a shaft of light –light leaking through the shadow realm's impenetrable walls.

I can hear somebody yelling a name again… the boys name.Somebody's calling out for him and they sound more frightened than I am.

Okay, what the hell is going on now—?

…

They are standing there before me caught in a strange glow of light. I can hear their voices crying out into the darkness.

I squint against the softly strengthening glare… who are they?

The two engaged in battle behind me seem for the most part unaware of them.

Three figures… three humans. A female, two males… they are standing right there before me and I can see them clearly in the darkness. They turn to Atemu. The Pharaoh can see them too and as I glance at him the thinnest of smiles slides across his face. He knows they are there and he's grateful for them. I haven't the foggiest idea why but for some reason, their sudden presence is strengthening him. Giving him courage. Giving him the very strength he needs to fight back against this… evil fool who killed his _aibou_ and abused the power of a millennium item… He is going to destroy him. Just as he promised me he would punish all those who used these items powers for wrong.

And as I listen, I can hear their voices, all crying out at once, just loud enough for me to make out over the harsh thud of my own heart.

'_Yugi we're here, don't let go, buddy, please don't let go. _

'_Ganbaru Yugi-kun, hang in there!'_

'_All of us are here for ya!_

Their voices are all so loud, so powerful and determined. But strongest of all is the voice of a girl. There are tears running down her cheeks and her teeth are clenched, but I can hear her thoughts as clearly as I can hear my own. _'Yugi,'_ she's thinking, that one name over and over again. _'Yugi we believe in you, like we always have! We believe in you with all our hearts!'_

Belief? But what's there to believe in now, girl? The boy you're praying for is already dead. Surely they can't be…

Suddenly, the female brunette opens her eyes and two piercing blue orbs glare right into mine, as if she sees me now, as if she knows what I am here to do.

'No!' she cries out.

She's looking at me…

Good lord she is looking RIGHT at me.

The boy's spirit… somehow he's in her arms and she's holding him tightly, like I might try and rip him away again. And she's not on her own. There are two other faces still there with her, I know I'm not imagining them now. Faces I don't know, that I don't recognize.

'Please don't take him away from us,' she whispers. 'Onegai shimasu.'

She's talking to me. Does she know I'm here? She _must_ do. Her spirit is stood right in front of me in the darkness of the shadow realm…

My mind lurches. How? _How_ is she here? How can a normal girl and two boys have forced themselves into the shadows like this?

Well… I don't know how but I know _why_. They're here to fight. To fight for their friend. The girl stands there clutching him, shielded by the two others standing before her. Their bodies glow softly with the faint white aura of life that is absent from the body of the boy in her arms.

Damn, I've heard of not wanting to let someone go, but this is ridiculous!

'Please,' the girl whispers to me, her large eyes filled with tears. 'Please, he can still win this. You have to let him win.'

'But…' (I must be mad, I'm talking to a girl who isn't there and yet I can't help but answer her) 'But… h-he's dead.'

'He's not dead,' she cries at me. 'He's not, please understand we won't let go of him, we can't let go.'

'You have to… it's too late.'

'It's never too late!' the girl screams, holding the body tightly to her chest and heart. 'We believe in him too much, can't you see? We won't let him die!'

The hands…

For the first item, I look at their hands… clutching each other tightly. There's a thin soft glowing emitted from marks on the back of their palms. The closer I look, the more it seems like… like a smile. A glowing, smiling face, painted right onto their skin, a face you can only see when they put their hands together in a circle.

Only there's a piece missing. The picture is unfinished. A piece of the friendship is gone, taken away…

I look back at the duel and Atemu continues fighting. I hear his voice screaming in vehemence and determination.

'Pegasus!' he is yelling, his voice filled with the same passion a sit was that day five thousand years ago in the sands of Egypt when he forced the shadow realm out of this world. 'You can do your worst to me, but this fight will be won by the card Yugi picked in his final act of courage!'

Whose turn is it? I can't tell, but something tells me the next strike made could be the final one in this duel. I have stepped into the middle of some kind of twisted nightmare and one way or another, somebody loses everything here today. I stand there useless and silent and it's all I can do to watch as the millennium beast that "Pegasus" calls "Relinquished" emits a violent green glow that surrounds Atemu's monster. Slowly, it starts being dragged into it. It tries to fight back, as it was ordered to do so but it can't. The strength of the beast is too powerful. Only now do I realise this monster's plan. Only now do I realise what he has in store for Atemu's Chaos Mage.

It's going to destroy him, and when it does so, it destroys Atemu.

'No, no…' I whisper. Fear building up in my voice. The other three are watching the battle with me, and their eyes are wide with horror.

'Come on, come on!' one of them is muttering. I can't tell who and it doesn't really matter. All that matter sis I am about to watch Atemu being destroyed… again! and once again there is nothing I can do about it. His spirit has survived all these years.. .and for what? I don't even know what he was doing here anyway. why he agreed to this hellish battle in which this boy, his friend has lost their life. I look back at the three – the children standing before me. they don't seem to know where to look, except for the girl. who has her eyes fixed upon the boy in her arms, her gaze and hold unbreakable. I couldn't have separated them with a sledgehammer right now.

'You have to let him live! One of the boys yells at me, his tone is harsh and angry, yet filled with feeling. 'You have to, we can do this together, but you can't take him now, please, don't take our friend!

I hesitate. I'm so overcome that it feels like I'm floating. This has never happened before.

They're stood there together, begging me with their hearts and minds while at the same time, sending all their energy to Atemu, giving the pharaoh power like I've never thought it possible for humans to muster. Begging for his victory, begging for this boy's life…

And that's when the worrying thought hits me- maybe… maybe they're right…

This boy… this Yugi, he has another spirit –the spirit of Atemu, my lost soul–

keeping his body. And he's got friends, friends who love him so much that they're piercing a hole right through the shadow realm itself, in a way only angels are supposed to be capable of.

Now that's what I call faith…

Maybe he can win. Maybe I'm the only thing standing in the way now…

…No! he's already dead, Angeni, you can't do this you know you can't! The rules…

Atemu and Pegasus battle with one another, while I just battle with my conscience… what do I do?

I look back to the battle. I can't see where else to look. And all at once it seems like none of these thoughts matter. Atemu's Chaos Mage is going to be destroyed, right here and now by that mass-eyed monstrosity. We are all going to lose here anyway…

Only…

Only I hear something else.

Not a cry this time, or a mysterious voice or a strange rumble of a shadow realm beast… what I'm hearing is a single, soft sort of… chirruping sound…

_What_?

Pegasus seems to visibly lurch in alarm and as I watch, Atemu turns over a face down card lying on his field, a smile creeps about his face.

'W-what's happening?' Pegasus screams. Atemu gazes at him and for some weird reason, I find myself laughing, I realise what has happened.

'You were right about your thousand eyes spell,' Atemu says. 'It did affect all of my hidden monsters.' He holds up the card he had face down. It takes all myself control not to shriek with excitement. 'Specifically my _Kuriboh_ and it paralysed him along with my chaos mage

My eyes widen and so does the single piercing brown eye of Atemu's rival. 'No! No this can't be!'

'Yes,' Atemu snaps mercilessly. As I watch he turns over his second down-card. 'And I activated my other down card Multiply. One Karibuo is becoming many.'

And indeed they are. A moment ago there was a single, small and quite frankly pathetic looking ball of fluff sitting in the centre of the arena looking like a flea for Relinquished's back. now there are two of them, now three, now for, now forty… I shudder. Iv ' never lied the Kuriboh and looking at them all growing and multiplying into thousands like that is slightly disturbing me, but at the same time I feel this unexplainable rush of triumph. I know they can win now, I know it!

Then I hear a cry of horror which pretty much snaps me out of my celebration. It comes from one of the boys and when I look back, I can see the girl staring in horror at the body in her arms. I can see the body in her arms disintegrating. Fading away piece by piece. I feel a rush of panic, we've been exposed here too long in this realm. If the essence of the shadow realm can have such a destructive effect on a human body, then that's nothing compared to the effect it has on the mind. Even mow I can see the very last ounces of colour draining out of this boys skin. His body breaking down and breaking up.

'Can't you see?' The blonde boy yells at me. 'He's winning _now_, the spirit's winning the duel! And if he wins so do we… Yugi has to be alive for that, let him be alive!'

I hesitate. I've been begged before, a thousand times. Begged by the dead and the dying to let them live and spare their lives, but never, never like _this_. I swear. I _can't_…

Oh god I just can't… I can't do this.

Can I?

'Help us!' The girl screams, her voice filled with pain and fear. She's losing her grip. If I don't get that boy's spirit out of here soon there will be nothing left of him at all. Nothing left to protect, nothing left to salvage. 'Please,' the girl cries again, clutching the boy for all she's worth. Tears are streaming down her cheeks and falling into the violet mists of the ugly realm all around us. 'Please help us, onegai… Yugi!'

…Why should the good suffer for the fate of others?

'Those disgusting fuzz balls,' I hear Pegasus gasping in revulsion as the air is filled with a million shrieking and wailing Kuriboh's. Kuriboh's which I now see being dragged slowly and unstoppably towards the gaping jaws of Relinquished. 'They're spreading like wildfire!'

The Karibuo are gluing themselves to the eyes of the restrict in their thousands, all of them wearing extremely confused, dizzy expressions on their fuzzy faces.

'Tens of thousands Pegasus,' Atemu smiles. 'and because of the way the Karibou's attack… you're about to see just as many explosions!'

And indeed that's exactly what we see. The air around us burns as the Karibou's tremble and shudder and begin to combust, their tiny bodies exploding and ripping the skin right from the eyes of that horrible beats. I can hear it screaming in pain, smell the sear of scorching flesh and fur. Hear Pegasus's cry of dismay as his monster is blinded one ripped up eye at a time.

Yes… yes! Atemu is winning. I know he will win now!

But it doesn't matter anyway, at least that's what I try to tell myself, the boy is dead and if I don't take him now his spirit will be destroyed forever. Yet there is no way I am going to get this girl to let go of him… I swear not even air could pass between them right now.

Can't she see? She's going to be as much his destroyer as Pegasus is?

'We've gotten this far!' she cries at me, it's as if she read my mind. 'don't you understand we've gotten his far, we can't lose him now!'

I glance hopelessly at Atemu as if he might help, but he can't see us. I don't know what to do. He's smiling proudly to himself in the shadow of his mage, knowing that he's won, knowing that the next strike he makes will destroy that monster for good and punish the man who murdered his aibou.

The Aibou who is disintegrating piece by piece right in front of me in his friends arms. She is staring at me in horror with tears running down her face. She doesn't know what to do. No matter how she tries she'll be unable to hang onto him. Friendship is strong. Strong enough to bring you from one world to another, but not touch enough to defy death…

I'm the only one who can help him now. And they know it.

'Are you just gonna stand there?' the darker boy screams. 'Do something! Make something happen, you're the angel here start actin' like one!'

I can hear Atemu yelling again, finishing the match, finishing this twisted game once and for all. My heart boils with hope and fear and… something else I can't quite explain. 'Now that your monster's transfixing gaze has been broken, my chaos mage is free.' Atemu yells. His voice is filled wit threat and determination that makes me tremble right at my bones. 'And _you_ Pegasus, are through

'Destroy him Atemu,' I whisper to myself, and for once in my life, I don't care if that's blasphemy. I don't care if I'm supposed to have respect for all life. You can't respect a man like that. You cannot respect a killer. 'Destroy him and every last dream he has or ever will have. Destroy his monster. Destroy everything.'

'Hey!' One of the boy's is yelling at me again, dragging at my attention. he has reached back and is gripping the girl by the shoulders, trying to support her. trying to give her the strength to keep their friend in this world, but it doesn't work. I can see the colour and light draining away from them as they are tugged on by the powerful grip of their own world. Soon the boy will be gone – vanished literally into nothing, and they will be ripped back to their own world without him. 'So?' The blonde yells at me again. 'What're you gonna do, make your choice lady, help us or no!'

A groan, comes up right from my stomach. For a brief instant I close my eyes, torn between what to do. Oh lord, I am so fired for this…

Then my eyes open, they brighten and intensify on the boy's body.

'Yugi.'

I say his name. Just once, and mostly to myself. I feel like that's a name I have to remember. For now and forever.

Then before I know it I'm running towards them. I'm pushing my way between the two boys and grasping at the girls arms and the boy between them. I take hold of Yugi and hold onto him, tightening my grip on the unconscious figure on the brink of death. I send shards of white fire charging from my heart into my hands and out into the girls flesh, and from her they reach out onto her friend's body. I stand there gripping him and yelling for all I'm worth. '_Ganbaru_, Yugi, you can do it, you can do it!'

Then something happens.

It's not a big something. Just a whisper. A twinge somewhere down in my gut. A powerful glittering spark of life arches up from my heart and burrows into the girls skin just above her heart. I see her gasp in alarm and clench the crumbling body in her arms a little tighter. Her blue eyes are vivid and bright. I grit my teeth hoping and concentrating for all I'm worth.

I can feel my grip loosening on the boy in her arms, and as I lose my grip so does the shadow realm. I can feel his spirit growing brighter and brighter. The distinctive aura that only the living can have leaping out of his otherwise dead form.

I can't believe it… I honestly can't believe it, I am reviving the dead! I am breaking the most important law ever made. I'm dashing aside everything I've ever been taught… all for the fate of one boy and an ancient pharaoh?!

And I don't even care!!!

I grit my teeth and shut my eyes telling myself I must be insane, but aloud I keep on screaming. I keep on gripping the girl's arms and listening to her crying and yelling and hoping and wishing for all I'm worth.

I will not allow this boy to die. Not this one. Not this time.

I can feel the shadow realm tugging back – it wants this soul and will do anything to claim him, but I will not let him go. My grip tightens. I feel a pair of soft warm hands on my shoulders. One belonging to each of the boys. They're here with me. even though they don't know me, they know what I am trying to do and they'll do anything to save this boy. They'll do anything to bring life back to him.

Behind me I can hear screaming. The screaming of a man who knows he has just lost a duel and is overcome by anguish. I can hear Atemu laughing, a bold, certain solid laugh of strength and courage.

For a brief moment the light grows to a level so violent it's blinding and all around me I hear the sound of shrieking, maybe my own, maybe somebody elses. It's impossible to tell.

I hear Atemu's final cry, a few simple, yet terrifying words:

'_Attack magician, chaos sceptre blast!' _


	5. Aftermath

**Scarab**- Okay people here we go, here's the FINAL chapter for you…

**Muse**- thank goodness for that… phew… this was getting kinda tense.

**Scarab** –what? All I did was send an angel to the shadow realm, rammed her into the pharaoh's mind and tried to make her take Yugi's soul.

**Muse** – um… right Scarab. turns to audience just in case you've forgotten this girl is not the owner of Yugioh, the only character in this story who belongs to her is that weird angel… okay read away… please enjoy and reviews would be nice pleaze.

FIVE: Aftermath

When my eyes finally open, there is nobody there. Nobody and nothing.

I blink a few times just to make sure I haven't gone temporarily blind. No, the shadow realm around me is empty. The children have vanished and so have the duellists. So has Yugi and the duel monsters and the Kuriboh's, so has the pharaoh. I am completely alone.

What the hell happened?

I stand up slowly (didn't realise I was lying down). Strange. The shadow realm is as cold and ominous as ever but now there's something more to it that I can't quite place. I smile softly to myself, amused. Once again Atemu has vanished out of my life (well, my _death_) and once again, I do not have the slightest idea where to or what has happened to him.

I hesitate, stirred by the sense of a presence. It feels as if I'm not alone at all. I can hear a soft voice calling in the darkness. I look round curiously. Turning my head left and right. It sounds ridiculous, but just once, I try calling the pharaoh's name.

'Atemu?'

There is no reply. Not that I honestly expected one. I didn't. Not really. Yet still I'm filled with the strangest sensation of not being alone. I can't see anything at all, but there's someone here with me. I _know_ there is. They are watching me from the darkness, and along with it, there's a strange sensation of thanks…

_Gratitude_? Somebody is thanking me. Maybe the girl with bright blue eyes, or the two boys. Maybe the pharaoh, maybe the pharaoh's _aibou_.

In all my time as a Collector, never once in my life have I felt that from anyone. Never once has anyone been grateful. If I could cry, then the tears would be running off my face.

Oh boy… I don't have a clue how I'm going to explain this…

Oh shoot.

To hell with the laws. To hell with the masters. I know I've done whatI was meant to do here. I know I've done something right…

Now, I won't say that I'm an extremely proud person. Not really. I can admit when I'm wrong or when I make mistakes, sure, easy, but…

Well the thing is, Angels really aren't supposed to let ANYONE go. Nobody. Not for any reason whatsoever. Even if they're undeserving shadow-victims. Even if they're horribly young with a thousand things they could have done with their lives. Even if they have an extra soul in their head and a bunch of other people's souls clinging onto them like limpets refusing to let them go.

When you're dead you're dead. You've got to go upstairs or downstairs but you can't just stay where you are, unless you want to end up hopelessly wandering the earth for eternity as some, banished spectre…

Unless of course, you've got a powerful magical artefact that can house the remains of your spirit…

It's against the rules. Break the rules in heaven and you get in _huge_ trouble. I mean how do you think we managed to enforce aeons of total peace and eternal rest up there, by letting everyone warp the system? They do not give us power over life and death so we can instil it on anyone we please and take it away from anyone who pisses us off whenever we choose.

So, I'm not being proud here when I tell you that I really, REALLY don't want it to get out that I went soft on a kid and helped his friends pull his soul back to his body. I'm being sensible. For one thing, it'll be completely embarrassing and for another, I would probably lose my job.

But… you know just this once, it really didn't feel like that mattered. Something told me that this kid didn't just deserve to live. He _had_ to live. All those people counting on him…

And then there was the link with Atemu… with my first. Maybe that's why I wanted to keep him alive so much. Five millennia ago, I couldn't give Atemu the life he wanted, not for any selfish reasons, but because he wanted to use that life to protect others. Five millennia later, Yugi _gave_ me that chance.

You know, I get the feeling that I'll never get that guy where I'm meant to take him. The pharaoh is impossible. He's never going to die…

…And I will say this one thing for you. Duel Monsters is one hell of a game…

**Scarab** - Right… there we go. Well this isn't half bad for a fic featuring an OC is it? Yugi's a bit OOC – sorry about that, but I reckon I captured Pegasus really well.

**Muse** – that's because you were nicking his phrases from the TV show, Scarab… awk!

**Scarab** – grabs Muse and stuffs her back in jar Musey, shut up! Erm… heh, heh ;; … well erm, anyway. I'd really like some reviews for this one please. I like it, but I'm not sure it works as a Yugioh Fic. So erm… off you go and enjoy your lives. Thanks for taking time to read my work… Seeya!


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